Moments before President Obama ended his brief visit to Israel last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu placed an unexpected phone call with hopeful implications for greater stability across the Middle East.

With a subtle nudge from the president, Netanyahu called Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to apologize for a deadly 2010 Israeli raid on a Turkish ship carrying supplies intended for Palestinians in Gaza.

Netanyahu also promised compensation for victims' families and a relaxation of restriction on the movement of civilian supplies to Gaza. The result is a welcome restoration of normal relations between the Jewish state and Turkey, a NATO member and the most economically advanced and militarily powerful state in the Muslim world.

It also re-cements a strong diplomatic triangle linking Tel Aviv and Ankara with Washington in the cause of peace. Not incidentally, it gives a nicely timed boost to U.S. diplomatic standing across the volatile region is also a welcome benefit.

The diplomatic reset with Turkey ends Israel's dangerous isolation in its neighborhood. In time, we can hope the Israeli-Turkish relationship will once again come to be marked by the cooperation and bonds of friendship that existed before the 2010 incident and a 2009 disagreement over Gaza.

The rapprochement is well timed for Turkey as the Ankara government seeks to displace the embattled Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, in keeping with its diplomatic strategy of facing east into the Islamic world.

According to a Wall Street Journal report, the phone call and subsequent renewal of ties between Turkey and Israel was the result of months of U.S. shuttle diplomacy to shape the precise language and tone that would give Netanyahu confidence to make the long-awaited apology.

According to the Journal, Obama was present when Netanyahu placed the call from a trailer on the tarmac of Israel's Ben Gurion Airport.

It is often said about Middle East peace that a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

Last week's dramatic, well-prepared phone call is an important step toward peace, but the journey is still a thousand miles.